medical update

Kyle is working round-the-clock right now, so I wanted to let you all know that I had a set of scans last week that showed nothing. As in the cancer had neither increased nor decreased. This is good news. I have these scans every three months to see if the cancer has managed to mutate in a way that the medicine no longer treats, and now I am good for another three months. I had a great talk with my therapist--if you are close to me, you know I love my therapist in a way that makes it confusing to me that I can't just have her over for seder--and she helped me understand my grief at hearing the news that the scans were fine. What I really wanted to hear, in the world of fantastic miracles, the land where you open a wardrobe door and tumble into Narnia, is that I don't have cancer anymore. So I had to muddle my way to gratitude over the last couple of days. In the next three months I hope to write more, read more, eat meals with friends and families more, and spend some real time trying to meditate more.

I also finally shaved my head. I don't think I've spoken here about what it's been like to lose my hair. Put this into the category of things that it never occurred to me to wonder how they happen: how does one's hair fall out when taking chemo drugs? For me, and many others, it came out in great handfuls--like the great handfuls of golden mane that Susan and Lucy hang onto in Aslan's mane as they run across Narnia to join the battle against the White Witch (you'll be happy to know we finished reading this book at nighttime last night so I will soon be on to some other set of references--it's time to read Charlotte's Web, but can I possibly get through Charlotte's death this round? The big kids all probably remember me weeping every time i got to that passage when I was reading it to each of them. It's okay, I would say, mom's just crying.) Anyhow, these handfuls of hair would fall out in the shower, and even though I knew the hair was falling out because of the medicine, not because of the cancer, well the reason I am taking the medicine is the cancer, so every shower became kind of an existential crisis. I had asked both Zoe and Kyle to tell me when the time had come, which for me was when you could really see my scalp through my remaining hair (and follow this logic: I would be reluctant to let people see my scalp through my hair, so I best shave it all off so that what? the only thing you see is scalp? I don't know--it made infinite sense to me). And they both told me it was time within a day of each other. The other thing about Tarceva is that it is working at an epidermal level, which is why my skin is astonishingly dry, so my scalp had really been hurting. The hair follicles were so inflamed it felt as though my head was bruised. Kyle did a beautiful, meticulous job shaving it. And as soon as it was off, the pain lifted, completely.

I have all manner of hat--inexpensive ones from Amazon, expensive sport wraps, warm woolen hats--and today a dear friend brought me a gorgeous Hermes scarf, which if you know how I dress, goes perfectly with my usual uniform of black yoga pants and a huge, old black sweater over an old white t-shirt. But I wore it tonight, and it was cool beauty against my skin.

Meanwhile, I had been preparing the little boys for the change. But Asher can only say that I look funny (he is carefully watching the reaction of others as they visit--he insists they see my bald head and when the viewer says I think this looks beautiful, Asher says, well I think it's funny, but with less and less conviction each time), and Elijah hates it and says he wants his old mommy back. I do too, Elijah.